Review: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

In games, as in film, Indiana Jones has had a rough patch. The intrepid archaeologist's recent big-screen exploits have met with lukewarm reception at best, with 2008's The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and 2023's The Dial of Destiny both failing to reignite the excitement enjoyed by the original 1980s trilogy; so, too, have his gaming excursions struggled. A defunct Facebook game, a handful of mobile efforts, and a couple of Lego outings over the last 15 years are all poor follow-ups to the likes of The Fate of Atlantis. Thankfully, The Great Circle marks a reversal of fortunes. This is an adventure impressive enough to stand alongside Spielberg's finest cinematic moments.

It could have gone the other way. Early on, developer MachineGames hewed too closely to the movies' template, with an intro sequence that replicates almost shot-for-shot (bar the first-person perspective) the opening to Raiders of the Lost Ark. The result is a linear experience that feels scared to deviate from the Holy Trilogy, reverent of their standing to the point of timidity. Mercifully, this is largely restricted only to the tutorial section—one boulder escape and a rescued fedora later, we jump to 1937 and the game begins to show what it's really made of.

Set between Raiders and The Last Crusade, The Great Circle properly kicks off when a seemingly unimportant relic is stolen from Dr. Jones’ academic home of Marshall College by a towering man in black, the only clue left behind being a pendant pointing Indy to the Vatican. Faster than you can pack a bullwhip and trace a red line across a map, Indy's teaming with investigative reporter Gina Lombardi to uncover an ancient order of giants, all while chasing down Nazi madman Emmerich Voss, who seeks to unearth occult forces to give Hitler a supernatural edge in the war.

Rather than go the fully open world route, MachineGames opts instead for contained sandbox areas for each scene. From the Vatican to Gizeh (now Giza), to Sukhothai in Siam (now Thailand), every stop on the hunt for Voss is gorgeously realized and packed with mysteries to uncover, but not so dauntingly vast that exploration becomes a chore. There's a fantastic verticality to locations, from scrambling across rooftop mazes to crawling through crypts, making each area feel even larger. Although certain elements repeat in each key setting—find a disguise to blend in, aid some locals, try to find key artifacts before Voss—you're unlikely to stand still long enough for it to ever become stagnant or repetitive.

The result is that The Great Circle almost feels like two games in one, depending on your preferred play style. Barrel through core quest objectives, and it's a zippy, interactive Indiana Jones movie, packed with all the humor, thrills, and charm audiences have come to love. Take your time to hunt down every collectible and solve every ancient puzzle, and it feels like an evolution of Uncharted or Tomb Raider, the two gaming franchises most influenced by Indiana Jones in the first place. A great circle, indeed.

No Ticket!

It's all quite a departure from the developer's earlier Wolfenstein games. While there's no shortage of Nazis (or Italian Blackshirts, or Imperial Japanese soldiers) for Indy to punch out, there's not necessarily any benefit to killing every fascist you encounter. The emphasis is firmly on stealth, subterfuge via disguises, and judicial use of combat only when necessary. Opening fire on enemies is only likely to attract even more unwanted attention, which rarely ends well—far better to use any gun as a cudgel to quietly bludgeon enemies unconscious. You're occasionally treated to a pithily sardonic punchline from Indy in the process.

Melee combat is one of the great strengths of The Great Circle. Whether stunning a Nazi guard from behind with a sneakily delivered rifle butt or hand-to-hand bare-knuckle boxing, every blow lands with an incredibly satisfying heft to it. It feels entirely authentic for the character—Indy hasn't been reimagined in the model of Wolfenstein's BJ Blazkowicz, gunning down anything that moves. He's still the flawed and extremely breakable hero who gets by on luck more often than brute force. That sense of vulnerability creates opportunities for perfect Indy moments, like dashing to knock out a Nazi captain who's spotted you, pummeling him at the very last second before he can alert others with his whistle. It all feels fantastic.

While Indy's iconic whip can be used to stun enemies or yank unsuspecting foes to the ground, it's more often used for exploration purposes, becoming a rope to climb or swing from to dodge traps or reach otherwise inaccessible areas. These moments allow the game to flex a little visual muscle too, seamlessly transitioning from first- to third-person view, showing off the spot-on likeness of an in-his-prime Harrison Ford while also making navigating some of the trickier corners of hazardous catacombs a bit more approachable.

Although there's some RPG-like character growth, The Great Circle avoids any grind for experience points. Instead, Indy earns “Adventure Points” from indulging in more cerebral pursuits like solving mysteries, finding clues, or taking photos that can be spent to study books. These unlock expected traits such as boosted health and stamina, but also fun skills, like a combat do-over when Indy grabs his trademark hat after losing a fight. As he pops it back on with a grimace and a cock of his head, you know he means business.

Why’d It Have to Be Snakes?

That's the key: The Great Circle feels like Indiana Jones at its finest. The game not only perfectly captures the two-fisted, swashbuckling tone of the original movies—and the pulp novels that inspired them—but does extraordinary character work along the way.

As on film, Indy is so genuinely excited by ancient mysteries and long-buried secrets that he can't help but blab his breakthroughs out loud, even when held at gunpoint by his enemies. He's the guy for whom fortune never quite pans out, whose every plan goes slightly awry, who can't abide snakes, scorpions, or spiders but keeps rummaging through ruins where he can't avoid them. You can't help but root for him. This is all helped by a truly stunning performance by Troy Baker, whose impersonation of Ford is so flawless, you'll likely check the credits to make sure it's not actually him.

The whole cast impresses, though. Alessandra Mastronardi's Gina is fiery enough to rival Marion Ravenwood as Indy's leading lady, Marios Gavrilis' menacing, insidious Voss makes for an absolute bastard of a villain who you can't wait to see get his inevitable comeuppance, while the sadly passed Tony Todd serves rumbly gravitas in a key role we won't spoil.

There are certainly points at which The Great Circle feels too focused on a presumed cinematic audience rather than a gaming one, though. There's a bit of an insistence on showing thrillingly choreographed fight scenes or dazzling set pieces—some so impressive that they could easily have made Spielberg's shot lists—rather than letting people play them. Similarly, while some plaudits are well deserved for its accessibility options—both in terms of visual filters to help color-blind players, and tools to make puzzles and combat easier—more proficient gamers may want more challenge than even the highest difficulty settings offer.

A case could be made that MachineGames is simply playing the hits here, setting everything between the events of the character's two most popular films and serving up a remix of treasure hunting, Nazi punching, and plenty of fan service moments, all set to a score by Gordy Haab that leans heavily on the standards set by John Williams. Despite that, there's so much care and attention to detail, and so much joy in the end results, that it's hard to be too upset about it. In both franchise and character, this is Indiana Jones at the best its been in decades.